What's right and wrong about sports today

By Rick Morris

This past week saw some unbelievable instances of good and bad in the sports world. Leaving aside the major headline stories like the Clemens needle saga on Capitol Hill, there were still some wild sagas raging all over the place.

Take for example Kevin Hart, the dumb kid in a tiny Nevada town who fabricated an entire narrative about being the object of a major recruiting war. This past Wednesday, in front of a crowded gym at his high school and a host of media outlets, he ostentatiously placed a California hat on his head to signify that he was going to be a Golden Bear. One small problem: it was news to Cal! NOBODY was trying to sign this kid, who embellished an entire process culminating in the National Signing Day circus at his high school knowing all along that the bill was going to come due for his shenanigans.

I’m not sure who leaves me more in amazement, this dunce or everyone in the media who believed his story without doing even the tiniest bit of research on him. Having said that, we’ve all done stupid things, albeit probably not on this scale, so hopefully this doesn’t dog this chap for the rest of his days. But it is emblematic of the tendency for impressionable kids to give in to their desire to become a big star at all costs, even for only a short while.

Also on the bad side of the ledger, we saw the perfect storm of miserable conduct as anticipated when Indiana visited Illinois in a Big Ten hoops grudge match. Eric Gordon, the insanely prized recruit who did an 11^th hour takeback on his Ilini commitment last year, was paying his first visit (and what will mercifully likely be his only one, what with the NBA beckoning strongly after this year) to Assembly Hall. For his last minute “yoink,” he was rewarded with dirty play throughout from Illinois and profane chants from the crowd toward his family and himself. The belated apology from the university did little to hide just how much moral squalor the coaching staff, players and drunken bozos in the crowd reveled in this past Thursday.

Finally, there was something to salute over the last week. While the passing of an uplifting figure is never a good thing, it does offer a chance to reflect and revel in what they brought us. Karl Erhardt, the “Sign Man” of Shea Stadium who held up block-lettered messages in support of his home team, passed away this week and has been getting memorialized in appreciation of what he meant to people. Fans like Sign Man and the late “Neutron Man” of Ohio State football fame (but not gravy-training self-promoters like “Big Dawg”) represent the increasingly small corner of sport that is untainted by greed and hate and selfishness. It shouldn’t have to take Mr. Erhardt’s passing to remind us to celebrate the example of pure fandom they set.

OSU stays #1 in throwback fashion

By Rick Morris

(NOTE: This is a report filed after attending today's Ohio State-Wisconsin game.)

On an afternoon at the Horseshoe in Columbus that saw the unlikelihoods stack on top of one another, higher and higher, it became difficult to determine which was the biggest of all.

Some might have cited Ohio State's defensive collapse early in the third quarter, that, combined with uneven offensive play in the first half, put the 16 1/2 point favorite and the nation's top-ranked team in their first real jeopardy of the season.

Some might have cited a Wisconsin team known for a bruising running game being able to establish the pass far more successfully on this afternoon -- and still winning the time of possession battle.

Some might have cited the spate of poor tackling that inexplicably befell the nation's top defense during the aforementioned critical stretch in the third quarter.

But the most insightful people would have cited the manner in which the Buckeyes mounted their successful and overwhelming comeback: a throwback to the three-yards-and-a-cloud-of-dust offense of Woody Hayes that featured one of the school's greatest second-half rushing performances ever by sophomore running back Chris Wells.

Wells ran for 144 of his 169 yards and three touchdowns after halftime in a career-defining performance that led #1 Ohio State (10-0, 6-0 in the Big Ten) past Wisconsin, 38-17 (7-3, 3-3) before 105,449 delirious fans at Ohio Stadium. The victory was OSU's 20th in a row in the Big Ten, earning them the all-time conference record for consecutive wins.

It was a classic example of the game being much closer than the score would indicate, as the Buckeyes did not even come back to tie the game until the 2:41 mark of the third quarter, before adding three scores in the final stanza. Before that point, the game seemed destined to go all the way down to the wire.

Ohio State took the opening kickoff and stormed down the field with a seven-play, 75-yard drive that culminated in the first of two Brian Robiskie touchdown receptions on the day. Wisconsin answered with a surprisingly balanced 15-play, 77-yard drive for a field goal. The key play was a shocking fake punt, a 31-yard pass from Ken DeBauche to Paul Standring that provided enough momentum to ensure points on the board. From there, however, both defenses settled into a bend-but-don't-break mold and the only remaining points in the first half came on a 27-yard Ryan Pretorius field goal with six seconds remaining.

And then, amazingly, the Badgers came out firing with a big play offense in the second half that gave them touchdowns on their first two possessions to take a 17-10 lead and back the Buckeyes into their biggest corner of the season thus far. Wells then proceeded to run at and over the Wisconsin defense with equal ruthless efficiency during the course of four Buckeye touchdown drives the rest of the day. The extent to which the team imposed its will physically on Wisconsin was made more apparent by the fact that it did so despite losing the time of possession battle, 27:41-32:19. The Badgers sealed their doom with an unsuccessful, ill-advised and apparently unscripted second attempt at a fake punt from their own 27 trailing 24-17 in the early fourth quarter.

Wells was not alone in his dominance. On a day when the Buckeyes needed their biggest stars to play up to their potential, most did so and many posted career-best performances. Vernon Gholston became the third player in OSU history to record four sacks in a game and fellow defensive anchor James Laurinaitus recorded a career-high 19 tackles. The two Brians at wide receiver stood tall as well, as Robiskie's three-catch, 46-yard effort included two touchdown receptions and Hartline had a career-high seven catches for 95 yards, including a career-best 45-yard reception to set up the field goal before halftime. Quarterback Todd Boeckman was at least solid, with a 17-for-28, 166-yard, two-touchdown performance. Aside from the occasional multi-receiver spread, he ended up executing a very basic offense that only featured one screen pass to Brandon Saine, a seven-yard catch in the second quarter that resulted in a first down.

The Badgers' loss snuffed out any faint hopes of a BCS bowl bid and puts them firmly in the position of hoping for one of the Big Ten bowl slots on January 1. For Ohio State, a resurgent Illinois team awaits next week for the final home game, then the annual clash with archrival Michigan that could conceivably catapult them into the national championship game for a second straight season.